he Mikado is regarded as a god. Passionate devotion
to country is the great ruling power which separates Japan from all
other modern nations.

The number of young men who leave their country to escape the three
years' conscription is very small. The schoolboy in his most
impressionable years is brought to these sacred shrines; he listens to
the story of the Forty-seven Ronins and other tales of Japanese
chivalry; his soul is fired to imitate their self-sacrificing
patriotism. The bloody slopes of Port Arthur witnessed the effect of
such training as this.

THE JAPANESE CAPITAL AND ITS PARKS AND TEMPLES

Tokio, the capital of Japan, is a picturesque city of enormous extent
and the tourist who sees it in two or three days must expect to do
strenuous work. The city, which actually covers one hundred square
miles, is built on the low shore of Tokio bay and is intersected by the
Sumi river and a network of narrow canals. The river and these canals
are crossed by frequent bridges. At night the tourist may mark his
approach to one of these canals by the evil odors that poison the air.
Even in October the air is sultry in Tokio during the day and far into
the night, but toward morning a penetrating damp wind arises.

Although Tokio's main streets have been widened to imposing avenues that
run through a series of great parks, the native life may be studied on
every hand--for a block from the big streets, with their clanging
electric cars, one comes upon narrow alleys lined with shops and teeming
with life. Here, for the first time, the tourist sees Japanese city
life, only slightly influenced by foreign customs. The streets are not
more than twelve or fifteen feet wide, curbed on each side by flat
blocks of granite, seldom more than a foot or eighteen inches wide.
These furnish the only substitute for a sidewalk in rainy weather, as
most of the streets are macadamized. A slight rainfall wets the surface
and makes walking for the foreigner very disagreeable. The Japanese use
in rainy weather the wooden sandal with two transverse clogs about two
inches high, which lifts him out of the mud. All Japanese dignitaries
and nearly all foreigners use the jinrikisha, which has the right of way
in the narrow streets. The most common sound in the streets is the bell
of the rickshaw man or his warning shout of "Hi! Hi!"

My first day's excursion included a ride through Shiba and Hibiya parks
to Uyeno Park, the resting place of many of